m^mmmmmmmmm^Mm 


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ADDRESS 


TO  THE 


St.  Andrew's  Society 


San  Francisco,  April  3rd,   1916 


BY 


DR.  W.  F.  McNUTT 


SAN    FRANCISCO: 

JOHN    R.    MCNICOLL   PRINTING    CO..    213    LEIDESDORFF   STREET 

1916 


Address  to  the  St.  Andrews  Society 

By     ■      '      - 
Dr.  W.  F.  McNUTT 

Mr.  President  and  Friends: 

The  text  this  evening  is  Our  Hyphenated  Friends  and 
a  few  remarks  on  collateral  subjects. 

It  is  said  of  the  Scotchman  that  he  must  always  talk  or  preach 
from  a  text,  and  that  his  hearers  never  expect  or  require  his 
preachment  to  have  any  particular  relation  to  the  theme  indi- 
cated by  the  text.  For  instance,  the  dear  old  minister  that  I 
have  in  days  agone  listened  to  a  thousand  times,  regardless  of 
what  his  text  might  be,  somewhere  in  the  course  of  his  long 
sermon  never  failed  to  remind  us  that  we  could  be  sure  our  sins 
would  find  us  out.  From  the  great  number  of  indictments 
being  issued  of  late  by  our  courts  we  are  quite  justified  in 
believing  that  the  sins  of  at  least  some  of  our  hyphenated 
friends,  are  finding  them  out.  Since  so  many  of  our  hyphen- 
ated citizens  have  abused  our  hospitality  and  proved  faithless 
to  the  country  they  solemnly  swore  to  defend  and  protect  and 
dishonored  the  country  from  which  they  came,  it  is  a  matter  of 
congratulation  that  hot  in  the  political  arena  or  in  electioneer- 
ing handbills  do  we  find  demagogues  bidding  for  hyphenated 
Scotch  votes.  The  Scotch  have  left  the  hyphen  to  those  who 
have  made  it  a  byword  and  a  scandal.  We  most  undoubtedly 
have  too  many  hyphenated  citizens  who  designate  the  land  of 
their  nativity  by  a  very  large  capital  letter  before  the  hyphen 
and  a  very  small  a  after  it.  When  a  Scotchman  takes  up  his 
abode  in  a  foreign  land,  he  becomes  a  respectable  and  honored 
citizen  of  the  country,  and  would  despise  to  stoop  to  the  dis- 
honorable and  dastardly  methods  now  being  perpetrated  in 
this  country  by  so  many  of  our  hyphenated  citizens  and  their 
countrymen.  When  an  alien  becomes  an  American  by  adoption, 
he  should  be  an  American  in  fact,  no  hyphen.  It  is  reported 
broadcast  that  many  of  our  hyphenated  citizens  have  received 
dispensations  from  the  governments  of  their  nativitity,  allowing 
them  to  become  citizens  of  our  country  for  political  and  voting 
purposes,  while  they  retain  their  citizenship  in  the  government 


638918 


from^which  the}^  ^solemrJy  swore  to  forever  sever  their  obliga- 
tion?.* V^^pron]  '•gli(>h{.*qiii:5€ns  and  the  governments  issuing  the 
di^peosationa.ejay  tbe^.^oft^  Lord  deHver  ns!  With  all  such, 
h^h(Ji:**iJ?^tCLit'arifcra'^y.  bubble. 

A  gentleman  invited  to  participate  in  a  hyphenated  race  con- 
vention of  his  countrymen,  recently  held  in  New  York,  declined 
the  invitation,  saying  that  he  was  "so  fully  occupied  just  now 
in  trying  to  be  a  faithful  American  citizen  that  he  had  no  time 
for  considerations  of  the  fortunes  of  any  other  country,  except 
to  sympathize  with  the  unfortunate  peoples  afflicted  by  the 
unspeakaHe  horrors  of  the  European  War."  The  Executive 
Committee  of  a  society  of  the  same  race,  also  declining  the 
invitation,  wrote  saying  they  "thought  that  the  people  at  home 
are  better  judges  of  their  rights,  their  policies  and  their  duties, 
than  any  number  of  praiseworthy  and  well-meaning  men  of 
their  race  in  America."  These  men  are  Americans  in  fact — no 
hyphen. 

The  Literary  Digest,  one  of  our  best  and  most  conservative 
journals,  heads  an  article  in  a  March  number  thus :  the  "Teuton 
Lobby"  in  Congress,  "an  astounding  chapter  in  the  continued 
story  of  German  conspiracy  against  the  United  States  is  to  be 
read  in  the  documents  revealing  the  political  activities  of  the 
national  German-American  Alliance."  The  New  York  Evening 
Sun  says :  "An  organized  effort  has  been  made  and  is  still  being 
made  to  rule  America  from  Potsdam." 

That  staid  and  conservative  journal,  The  North  American 
Review,  thinks  that  it  is  high  time  that  something  should  be 
done  to  prevent  dual  citizenship ;  that  aliens  coming  here  have 
no  right  to  use  their  political  activities  in  the  interest  of  their 
native  country,  rather  than  in  the  welfare  of  their  adopted  coun- 
try and  adds,  "the  hyphen  must  go."  To  which  every  good 
American  says,  amen.  While  the  hyphenated  societies  and 
leagues  have  in  their  members  many  of  the  best  examples  of 
American  citizenship,  their  members  are  not  ignorant  of  the 
fact  that  their  societies  are  too  often  used  for  political  pur- 
poses and  not  always  in  the  interest  and  welfare  of  their 
adopted  country,  but  in  the  interest  of  their  native  land.  So 
long  as  their  names  appear  in  the  roll  of  hyphenated  citizens, 
they  have  no  right  to  complain  if  the  American  looks  at  them 
askance  and  questions  their  loyalty.  "No  man  can  serve  two 
masters."  The  dual  citizen  must  go.  This  country  welcomes, 
regardless  of  creed  or  nationality,  men  and  women,  boys  and 


girls,  who  will  become  good,  red-blooded  United  States  citizens. 
May  the  time  soon  come  when  no  others  need  apply :  no 
hyphenated,  no  dual  citizens  wanted. 

While  Europe  is  involved  in  this,  the  greatest  war  of  all 
times,  it  is  to  be  expected  that  each  of  us  should  sympathize 
with  the  country  of  his  nativity  engaged  in  so  cruel  a  war.  But 
we  should  never  forget  our  sacred  obligations  to  the  land  we 
live  in.  The  strictest  neutrality  does  not  imply  indifference. 
That  we  have  been  welcomed  to  this  country,  protected  by  its 
laws,  offered  every  opportunity  to  advance  our  own  interest, 
and  it  is  our  duty  to  assist  this  nation  and  administration  in  itc. 
sincere  desire  to  retain  the  friendship  of  all  belligerents  and  to 
act  the  honorable  part  of  a  neutral  neighbor.  Unfortunately, 
too  many  of  our  foreign  and  hyphenated  friends  have  abused 
their  accepted  hospitality,  ignored  their  obligations  and  have 
become  a  danger  to  the  country  that  welcomes  and  protects 
them.  They  have  compelled  our  government,  railroads,  ship- 
ping concerns  and  manufacturers,  to  double-guard  their  prop- 
erties and  the  lives  of  their  employees  against  a  class  of  these 
citizens,  whose  diabolic  deeds,  smell  to  heaven. 

The  traitor  to  the  country  in  which  he  lives  and  whose  hos- 
pitality he  accepts  and  enjoys,  or  a  traitor  to  his  adopted  coun- 
try, is  just  as  debased  and  false  as  is  the  traitor  to  the  manor 
born,  he  "is  a  stain  of  his  breed,  dishonoring  manhood's  form," 
a  shame  and  discredit  to  the  mother  who  gave  him  birth.  We 
have  all  heard  the  expression — "fair  weather  Christians,"  which 
is  intended  to  mean  that  they  are  respectable  in  their  church 
attendance  and  duties  so  long  as  no  sacrifice  is  required  of 
them,  while  no  trying  circumstances  arise  to  test  their  sin- 
cerity and  integrity.  It  is  much  to  be  regretted  that  so  many  of 
our  hyphenated  friends  have  proved  that  they  were  only  fair 
weather  citizens ;  that  they  wore  the  livery  of  the  loyal  citizen 
to  serve  the  country  of  their  nativity  in.  Thus  has  our  gov- 
ernment been  betrayed  by  unholy  tongues,  and  basely  stung  by 
traitorous  citizens.  That  they  were  considered  good  citizens  is 
true,  which  only  serves  to  make  their  apostacy  the  more  lament- 
able. What  a  disappointment,  what  a  degradation,  what  a  per- 
vertion  from  good  citizenship. 

A  nation  is  but  a  collection  of  individuals  and  the  world  is 
generally  willing  to  allow  the  individual  to  estimate  his  own 
value  and  importance.  Our  hyphenated  German  friends  have 
so  often  and  loudly  proclaimed  for  their  country  vast  supe- 


riority  in  science,  art,  literature,  culture,  government  and  about 
everything  else,  that  thousands  who  have  given  the  matter  no 
great  thought  have  actually  come  to  believe  them.  They  are 
not  an  inventive  people.  They  are  not  in  any  sense  pioneers  in 
science,  art.  government,  literature,  or  music.  A  very  intelli- 
gent and  able  American  writer  says,  "People  talk  of  the  scien- 
tific German,  as  of  a  magical  super-monster  of  research.  What 
is  Germany's  message  to  the  world  ?  I  beg  to  remark  it  is  not 
science.  England,  let  us  remember,  taught  the  world  the 
elements  and  foundations  of  modern  practical  life,  of  modern 
government,  and  of  modern  business."  Liebig,  their  greatest 
chemist,  was  educated  as  a  chemist  in  France.  Says  an 
American  scientist,  "The  British  inventors  of  the  18th  century, 
Hargreaves,  Kay,  Wyatt,  Arkwright,  Watt,  etc..  gave  to  us  the 
means  by  which,  and  by  which  alone  a  rich  and  broad  life  can 
be  made  for  all  mankind.  They  gave  us  the  idea  and  practice  of 
power-driven  machinery.  Nothing  can  take  the  glory  away 
from  them,  the  most  fruitful  crop  of  practical  promoters  that 
ever  lived."  No  less  an  authority  than  Dr.  Henry  Smith  Wil- 
liams, when  asked  for  his  opinion  on  the  scientific  thinkers  of 
Europe,  said :  "The  French.  Germans,  Italians.  Dutch,  Scandi- 
navians, have  all  performed  prodigious  feats  in  the  conquest  of 
scientific  knowledge,  but  after  all,  counting  everything,  the 
leadership  is  England's."  Another  scientific  writer  says,  Who 
are  these  Germans  that  they  should  bring  into  international 
discussion  a  constant  claim  to  scientific  supremacy?  "They 
never  produced  any  m.an  or  any  ten  men,  or  any  hundred  men, 
who  so  utterly  altered  all  thought  for  all  the  world  as  did 
Darwin."  Nor  did  they  ever  produce  a  Pasteur  or  an  Edison. 
It  was  Pasteur  in  his  French  laboratory  who  changed  the 
whole  perspective  of  disease  by  his  germ  theory.  Before 
Pasteur's  time,  the  average  annual  death  rate  for  all  civilized 
nations  was  30  to  every  1 ,000  of  population.  Now  the  death  rate 
is  IS  to  the  1,000.  It  is  estimated  that  there  are  now  12.000,000 
fewer  deaths  annually  in  these  nations  than  before  Pasteur's 
day.  It  is  Pasteur's  germ  theory  that  has  deprived  of  its 
victory  "that  invisible  host — the  pestilence  that  walketh  in  dark- 
ness." We  owe  to  French  laboratories  the  new  science  of 
Radio-activity,  whose  possibilities  we  dare  not  as  yet  even  pre- 
dict. And  it  was  our  own  Edison — the  electric  wizard,  who 
flunsf  the  challenge  to  the  "sable  goddess  on  her  ebon  throne" 


and  defied  the  power  of  her  leaden  sceptre  to  hold  the  night  in 
darkness. 

But  Germany  has  a  civic  message  for  the  world,  and  one  it 
would  be  well  for  every  nation  to  heed.  It  is  the  systematic, 
intelligent  and  laborious  application  of  scientific  methods  and 
inventions  to  the  arts  and  industries, — making  two  blades  of 
grass  grow  where  but  one  or  none  grew  before,  thus  giving 
employment  to  her  people  and  wealth  to  the  nation.  A  few 
years  ago  two  Americans,  Brady  and  Lovejoy,  invented  a 
method  by  which  nitrogen  could  be  taken  from  the  air,  since 
which  time  this  nation  has  paid  to  foreign  countries  millions  of 
dollars  for  nitrogenous  material.  The  Germans,  availing  them- 
selves of  the  Brady  and  Lovejoy  invention  of  synthetic  produc- 
tion, take  their  nitrogen  from  the  air.  It  is  not  the  inventor 
who  by  his  genius  benefits  a  nation,  but  he  who  makes  the  in- 
vention useful  to  the  people.  The  British  and  American 
bankers,  with  their  staff  of  clerks  and  scribes,  are  simply  high 
class  pawn  brokers.  The  German  bank  includes  in  its  stafif, 
expert  mechanics,  expert  chemists,  expert  commercial  advisers, 
expert  promoters,  any  one  of  which  is  at  the  service  of  him  who 
wishes  to  exploit  an  invention.  If  the  exploitation  meets  with 
the  approval  of  the  bank's  expert  or  experts,  the  bank's  money 
and  advisers  are  at  the  service  of  the  applicant.  Of  the  modern 
German  pushing  spirit, — to  quote  a  recent  English  writer :  "It 
is  the  most  highly  organized  machine,  the  most  deliberate  and 
thorough  going  system  for  arriving  at  material  ends,  which  has 
ever  been  devised  by  man."  This  is  Germany's  civic  message 
to  the  world,  and  I  beg  to  remark  that  it  is  not  the  result  of  the 
noble  teaching  of  the  Reformation. 

The  boosting  and  boasting  of  this  wonderful  German  learn- 
ing and  culture  we  hear  so  much  about,  is  not  always  from  our 
hyphenated  citizens.  At  a  German  banquet  recently  given  in 
New  York,  Chas.  W.  Eliot,  ex-President  of  Harvard  Univer- 
sity, made  in  a  speech,  remarks  which  I  have  heard  severely 
criticized.  He  said,  "The  Teutonic  peoples  set  a  higher  value 
on  Truth,  in  speech,  in  thought  and  in  action,  than  any  other 
peoples."  The  merciless,  inhuman  and  brutal  treatment  of 
Belgium's  innocent  women  and  children,  the  cold  blooded 
murder  of  that  administering  angel,  Nurse  Cavill,  the  sending 
of  hundreds  of  inoffensive  women  and  children  to  their  ocean 
grave  in  the  Lusitania,  I  suppose  are  illustrations  of  their  higher 
value  of  truth  in  action.     The  granting  of  a  holiday  to  their 


school  children,  that  they  might  too  rejoice  over  the  terrifying" 
struggles  and  the  dying  screams  of  despair  of  the  little  children 
clinging  to  their  mothers. as  they  went  down  to  their  water 
grave,  I  suppose  was  an  illustration  of  their  higher  value  of 
truth  in  thought  and  a  lesson  in  German  Kultur.  Their  moans, 
the  slimey  deep  redoubled  to  the  waves  and  they  to  heaven. 
The  punishment  of  this  accursed  and  barbarous  crime  we  leave. 
English  has  no  language  to  fittingly  depict  the  ferosity  of  such 
parlous  brutality.  Nor  has  civilized  humanity  the  mental  power 
to  conceive  the  degredation  of  soul  of  him  who  could  honor  by 
decoration  the  creature  who  perpetrated  the  fiendish  deed. 
"Vengeance  is  mine  saith  the  Lord.'"  Another  astounding 
statement  of  our  ex-President,  viz.,  ''The  great  doctrine  of  civic 
liberty,  in  industries,  in  society,  in  government,  is  the  result  of 
the  German  reformation,  and  America  has  been  the  greatest 
beneficiary  of  that  noble  teaching"  There  is  no  nation  abso- 
lutely independent  of  all  other  nations  for  its  advancement  in 
industries,  in  society,  in  government,  and  our  nation  is  the 
beneficiary  of  many.  Ours  is  not  and  never  was  and  never  can 
be  an  isolated  nation,  all  nations  are  bound  together  by  com- 
mercial and  other  ties.  Our  interests  have  always  been  and 
will  be  bound  to  the  interests  of  many  countries.  The  natural 
laws  of  the  universe  are  over  all,  we  cannot  escape  our  destiny. 
When  Louis  XIV.  revoked  an  edict  which  proved  so  detri- 
mental to  France,  it  added  physical,  material  and  moral  force  to 
our  country.  When  the  heir  to  the  Austrian  throne  was  struck 
down  at  Serajevo,  its  material  and  social  effects  have  been  felt 
in  our  country  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific. 

True,  none  of  the  blessings  and  privileges  that  we  enjoy 
sprung  full  fledged  from  American  independence.  Not  one  of 
our  liberties  was  conceived  in  America.  Every  one  of  them  had 
been  for  generations  fighting  that  monumental  fraud — the  di- 
vine right  of  kings — that  hollow  sham — privilege  of  birth,  that 
delusive  halo  of  caste. 

Long  before  the  German  reformation,  progressive  men  in 
Briton  had  conceived  and  dreamed  of  the  principles  of  temporal 
and  spiritual  liberty.  Others,  inspired  with  the  spirit  of  Jere- 
miah, and  feeling  that  "a.  man's  a  man  for  a'  that,"  had  pro- 
claimed them ;  patriots  unafraid  had  fought  for  them,  and  many 
martyrs  had  died  for  them.  The  progress  and  life  of  every 
nation  must  play  its  part  in  the  common  needs  and  requirements 
of  universal  civilization.    The  inter-dependence  of  nations  must 

6 


necessarily  increase  with  modern  facilities.  Fortunately,  our 
Constitution  was  not  the  beneficiary  of  that  noble  teaching  of 
the  German  reformation.  It  contains  no  trace  of  feudalism  or 
serfdom  or  of  privileged  classes,  or  divine  right  of  kings.  It 
has  more  the  footprints  of  England,  France  and  Holland  than 
of  the  "noble  teaching  of  Germany."  Frederick,  called  the 
Great,  was  but  a  few  years  older  than  Washington.  When 
speaking  of  his  people,  he  always  called  them  his  poor  cattle. 
Down  to  Napoleon's  time  the  feudal  system  prevailed  in  Ger- 
many ;  the  people  were  serfs  bound  to  the  soil.  The  govern- 
ment was,  as  at  present,  directed  by  the  privileged  classes  who 
had  a  full  belief  in  the  divine  right  of  kings.  Frederick  wielded 
a  facile  pen ;  he  wrote  a  severe  criticism  of  the  famous  French 
atheist  Holbach,  not  for  denying  God,  but  for  questioning  the 
divinity  of  kings.  In  Prussia,  of  Frederick's  subjects  there 
were  probably  not  five  hundred  persons  outside  the  public 
service  who"  had  any  political  opinion  of  their  own.  The  army 
was  officered  entirely  by  the  nobility.  Thie  nobility  were  not 
allowed  any  occupation  except  the  service  of  the  crown.  At 
the  opening  of  the  19th  century,  Germany  still  remained  a  prey 
to  the  tribal  system  of  the  Middle  Ages.  In  fact,  it  was  not 
until  1807  that  the  edict  of  Ritter  von  Stein  abolished  the 
mediaeval  arrangement  of  Prussian  society,  viz.,  serfage  and  the 
fixed  line  of  distinction  between  noble,  burghers  and  peasant. 

It  is  a  debatable  question  whether  there  would  have  been  any 
United  States  had  it  not  been  for  the  help  of  France,  in  money, 
ships,  munitions  and  men.  France  was  the  only  continental 
European  power  that  played  a  conspicuous  part  in  establishing 
and  influencing  the  early  history  and  independence  of  the 
United  States.  Germany  sent  her  Hessians,  but  surely  we  were 
not  her  beneficiaries  on  that  account.  The  Italian  Ferrero 
acknowledged  internationally  as  one  of  the  greatest  historians 
of  the  age,  says  of  Italy :  "At  least  part  of  the  intellectual  and 
moral  disorders  from  which  our  generation  has  suffered  so 
much  is  due  to  German  ideas  and  teaching.  Through  these 
we  are  losing  our  sense  of  right  and  justice  in  the  great  affairs 
of  the  world,  our  sense  of  humanities  in  art,  philosophy,  litera- 
ture and  politics."  He  is  evidently  not  enamored  with  the 
noble  teaching  of  Germany. 

Our  good  Dr.  Eliot  must  have  forgotten  that  the  English 
priest  and  great  reformer,  Wycliffe,  preceded  Luther  by  some 
150  years,  that  the  P>ritish  were  heading  for  democracy   100 


years  before  that  in  the  Magna  Charta,  strugghng  to  keep  ahve 
the  spark  of  freedom  throughout  the  long  dark  ages  of  violence 
and  oppression ;  the  example  of  their  sacrifices  and  their  noble 
teaching  have  come  bowling  down  the  ages.  Now  to  wane  and 
recede,  but  never  to  dye  out.  John  Calvin  and  John  Knox  were 
contemporaries  of  Luther.  A  great  number  of  people,  and  I 
expect  we  might  include  Mary,  Queen  of  Scots,  thought  Knox 
was  some  reformer.  Carlyle  called  him  the  master  mind  of  his 
day.  An  American  writer  says  of  him,  "To  the  memory  of 
John  Knox  we  acknowledge  our  obligations,  we  are  what  we 
are  because  this  man  lived." 

The  pioneers  of  New  England  were  more  the  beneficiaries  of 
Calvin  and  Knox  than  of  Luther.  They  brought  with  them 
their  Puritan  conscience,  the  spirit  of  the  Scotch  Convenanters 
— Religious  liberty  or  death — never  submit,  never  surrender! 
But  charity  is  the  greatest  of  all  virtues  and  we  mu^t  not  be  too 
exacting  in  criticising  a  post-prandial  speech.  Our  good  Dr. 
Eliot  is  a  gentleman  and  a  ripe  scholar,  I  have  no  doubt,  but 
the  German  wine  was  of  the  best  brand  and  plenty  of  it,  and  he 
considered  it  the  proper  thing  under  the  circumstance,  and  who 
would  not,  to  deal  out  a  little  fulsome  praise  and  flattery  to  his 
hosts,  who  would  readily  credit  him  with  a  high  sense  of  truth 
in  speech,  and  believe  that  he  was  the  beneficiary  of  that  great 
virtue  from  the  "noble  teaching  of  the  German  reformation." 

Let  us  remember  too  that  our  good  Dr.  Eliot  said,  "the  Ger- 
man peoples,"  and  we  must  not  forget  that  there  is  a  wide 
distinction  between  the  German  peoples  and  the  Prussian  mili- 
tary autocracy.  The  Germans,  when  not  hypnotized  by  Prus- 
sian militarism,  are  a  sympathetic  and  kindly  people,  the  Allies 
bear  them  no  unkindness.  They  leave  to  Prussia  a  monopoly 
of  the  gospel  of  hate.  They  realize  that  the  peasants  are 
dragooned  into  the  army  and  made  to  believe  by  the  Prussian 
militarist  that  they  are  fighting  in  defense  of  their  fatherland. 

Great  Britain  was  twenty  years  in  sending  Napoleon  to  St. 
Helena.  Her  population  at  that  time  was  only  about  ten 
millions.  It  was  not  her  numbers,  it  was  British  pluck  and 
persistance.  Now  the  great  British  Empire  encircles  the  earth. 
Some  portion  of  her  people  are  every  hour  in  the  twenty-four 
enjoying  the  sunlight.  Now  her  population  is  counted  by  the 
hundreds  of  millions.  It  is  not  to  the  noble  teaching  of  the  Ger- 
man reformation,  but  to  British  love  of  liberty,  civil  and  re- 
ligious, and  to  justice,  inasmuch  as  rich  and  poor  are  equal 

8 


before  the  law  (conceived  long  before  the  reformation),  she 
owes  the  fact  that  from  the  remotest  corners  of  her  vast 
Empire — from  "some  place  far  abroad,  where  sailors  gang  to 
fish  for  cod,"  to  India's  coral  strands,  comes  voluntary  help  in 
her  hour  of  need.  Her  enemies  hoped  and  thought  that  the 
British  state  was  disjointed  and  out  of  frame,  and  that  they 
could  alienate  her  provinces  and  engender  and  foster  inter- 
necine strife  in  Ireland.  Of  the  two  great  Irish  leaders,  he  of 
the  north,  Sir  Edward  Carson,  became  a  member  of  the  British 
cabinet,  and  the  Hon.  John  Redmond  of  the  south  said  in  Par- 
liament, "I  tell  the  Government  they  can  take  every  British 
soldier  out  of  Ireland  to  meet  the  enemy  of  the  Empire.  Ire- 
land's sons  will  take  care  of  Ireland.  The  Catholics  of  the  south 
will  stand  shoulder  to  shoulder  with  their  Protestant  fellow 
countrymen  of  the  north  to  fight  the  common  foe,"  and  they 
are  making  good.  Canada's  answer  to  the  enemy's  intrigues 
is : ,  We  are  coming.  Mother  Britain,  500,000  strong ;  500,000 
patriotic  hardy  sons  of  the  north,  in  the  morning  of  their  man- 
hood. The  bleaching  bones  of  the  Emden  is  Australia's  monu- 
ment of  her  loyalty  to  her  mother.  In  Africa  the  British  enemy 
has  been  despoiled  of  her  possessions,  while  from  far  oflf  India 
comes  the  cry,  "Our  sunburnt  sons  are  coming.  Long  live  the 
British  Empire." 

"The  best  laid  schemes  of  mice  and  men  gang  aft  aglee." 
Autocracy's  hope  of  world  dominion  is  fading  like  a  dream. 
That  strange  psychological  power  of  common  suffering  and  the 
mingling  of  the  blood  of  British  subjects  together  in  a  common 
cause  for  democracy  has  cemented  the  British  Empire  and 
guaranteed  the  imperial  destiny  of  all  the  British  possessions. 
1914  will  mark  a  new  era  for  Great  Britain  and  her  Provinces. 
It  was  then  they  were  reborn  and  became  the  great  British 
Empire,  one  and  indivisable  and  will  stand  or  fall  fighting  for 
the  principles  of  justice,  humanity  and  representative  govern- 
ment by  the  people,  for  the  people.  "For  he  to-day  that  sheds 
his  blood  with  me  shall  be  my  brother ;  be  he  ne'er  so  vile.  This 
day  shall  gentle  his  condition." 

The  English  language  is  the  commercial  language  of  the 
world  and  will  remain  so,  the  world  dominion  is  not  for  the 
noble  teaching  of  Germany.  The  British  provinces  are  not  to 
be  torn  from  their  mother.  Their  sturdy  sons  are  giving  a 
good  account  of  themselves  at  the  front.  A  few  weeks  ago  a 
Dutch  statistician  stated  that  Germany  was  spending  80  per 


cent  of  her  national  income  for  war  purposes,  and  that  England 
was  spending  10  per  cent  of  hers.  (It  was  stated  in  the 
Scientiiic  American  that  the  German  government  has  borrowed 
more  money  than  all  the  Allies.)  It  does  not  require  an  expert 
to  figure  out  what  the  necessary  result  must  be.  With  her  long 
and  thorough  preparation  for  war,  and  with  twice  the  number 
of  troops  and  four  times  the  number  of  artillery.  Germany 
thought  by  falling  suddenly  upon  her  unprepared  victim,  she 
could  smash  her  way  to  Paris.  She  found  to  her  cost  that  the 
Belgian  soldiers  of  to-day  are  worthy  sons  of  worthy  sires. 
The  great  Caesar  pronounced  the  Belgians  the  bravest  soldiers 
of  Europe.  And  she  failed  to  trample  down  the  invincible 
French  and  British  soldiers,  chivalrously  fighting  for  France, 
for  home  and  humanity,  out  numbered  and  half  prepared  as 
they  were.  As  to  the  final  outcome  of  this  great  war,  there  can 
be  but  one  ending,  the  Allies  have  no  call  for  discouragement. 

"Thrice  is  he  armed  that  hath  his  quarrel  just." 
Goth  "Shall  perish,  write  the  word, 

In  the  blood  that  she  has  spilt. 
Perish,  hopeless  and  abhorred. 

Deep  in  ruin  as  in  guilt." 

Whilfe  there  are  a  dozen  nations  involved  in  this  great  crisis, 
"the  fundamental  reason  of  this  war,  whose  great  decision  hath 
much  blood  let  forth,"  is  the  irrepressible  conflict  between 
democracy  and  autocracy,  between  the  democratic  British  Em- 
pire and  the  autocratic  German  Nation.  Between  democracy 
and  autocracy  there  is  a  deep  mutual  distrust  and  antagonism, 
an  irrepressible  moral  conflict.  Whether  representative  gov- 
ernment is  to  endure,  or  if  autocracy  with  its  divine  right  of 
kings  is  necessary  for  the  government  of  nations,  is  in  pro- 
gress of  solution.  The  sword  will  not  be  returned  to  its 
sheath  until  this  great  question  is  determined.  There  will  be 
no  compromise,  "One  must  prove  greatest — till  then,  blows, 
blood  and  death."  Woe  to  democracy  if  autocracy  be  vict- 
orious !  if  military  despotism  prevails !  Then  indeed  will  the 
government  of  the  people,  by  the  people  and  for  the  people, 
perish  from  the  earth.  The  famous  political  and  social  psycho- 
logist Graham  Wallas  says,  "a  decisive  victory  for  the  German 
governing  caste  in  their  present  temper  would  be  in  my  view 
a  disaster  to  all  that  I  most  value  in  civilization."  The  noted 
publicist  A.  G.  Gardier  says,  "behind  the  militarism  of  Napoleon 

10 


there  was  a  certain  human  and  even  democratic  fervour,  but 
behind  the  gospel  of  the  Kaiser  there  is  nothing  but  the  death 
of  the  free  human  spirit." 

When  one  or  the  other  of  these  cries,  Hold,  enough  !  there  will 
be  peace.  But  until  then,  imfortunately,  the  non-military  partici- 
pant peace  makers  may  continue  to  meet,  pray,  talk,  resolve  and 
adjourn,  and  wait  till  danger's  troubled  night  depart  and  the 
star  of  peace  return.  International  law,  peace  treaties,  arbitra- 
tion treaties,  national  praying  bouts,  Ford  lunacy  vaporings 
without  adequate  means  to  enforce  their  demands  and  desires, 
are  as  inefficient  for  peace  as  the  stuff  that  dreams  are  made  of. 

Germany  has  lost  all  her  provinces ;  all  her  foreign  trade. 
Her  flag  is  no  longer  seen  in  the  marts  of  the  world.  "Brit- 
tania  rules  the  waves." 

"Shatter  the  beauteous  breast  you  may, 
The  spirit  of  Britain  none  can  slay ; 
Dash  the  bomb  on  the  dome  of  Paul's, 
Deem  ye  the  fame  of  Nelson  falls  ?" 

The  British  are  a  dogged,  stubborn  and  persistent  race.  Her 
sons  at  the  front  to-day  came  from  fathers  of  war  proof,  fathers 
who  for  liberty,  justice  and  humanity  have  carnadined  the 
Seven  Seas  and  consecrated  every  land  with  their  blood. 


II 


G389iS 


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